Actually it was Laporte, IN, not Lapointe, where we slept Thursday night.
We were driving right past the Jayco factory as we continued east (they made our trailer) so we stopped to visit.
And then drove and drove, making it home just before midnight on Friday.
A long day of driving today (Thursday).
We left the western edge of Iowa in the morning and drove straight across the state.
Lots of farm country with hills and trees, prettier than the flat prairie of South Dakota. We also passed a large wind farm.
At Smokey D"s BBQ in Des Moines we had a delicious lunch and then pressed on.
Our goal today was to cross the Mississippi into Illinois, but once we passed the Quad Cities (4 small towns grouped together at the state borders), we wanted to get past Chicago.
Such a sudden change to an urban landscape as we crossed the Mississippi. Quite a shock after all our rural and mountain travel.
We are parked at Walmart at Lapointe, Indiana, tonight, only 7 1/2 hours from home!
If you read last year's adventures, you know that Mom is a Laura Ingalls Wilder fan. She persuaded the rest of the family to take a small detour north yesterday before leaving South Dakota.
The Ingalls family finally settled in De Smet, SD, which is the Little Town on the Prairie of the books. Charles ("Pa") was an important founder of the town.
It was interesting to see the locations of the various places mentioned in the books, but not many original buildings are left.
We went to the cemetery to see and pray at the family graves, and drove past (the replica of) Pa's claim shanty on the Ingalls' original claim.
We had lunch in town and then headed out on the road again.
Now we are just trying to get home. We drove south along the Missouri river (which is flooding north of here) into Iowa, where we spent the night at another nice little RV park.
The weather is a little unsettled with strong winds here and severe thunderstorms to the west. There was a tornado yesterday in South Dakota. We hope to miss anything serious as we continue home across the plains.
